


Blood

by ignitesthestars



Category: Dragon Age II
Genre: Angst and Humor, Canon-Typical Violence, Fluff and Angst, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-20
Updated: 2013-01-20
Packaged: 2017-11-26 06:22:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/647519
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ignitesthestars/pseuds/ignitesthestars
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Marian has to face down darkspawn for the first time since her brother died. It doesn't go so great at first.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Blood

Marian’s blood freezes, when she hears it. Darkspawn. The word echoes in her mind. The clearing is overrun by darkspawn.

She puts it off – and put it off, and puts it off. She quite literally fights a dragon instead, even drags herself through caverns of blighted spiders in order to fetch the rare ingredients that Solivitus insists he needs. There’s no coin until she delivers the ironbark, though, and the ironbark can only be found in one clearing, and that clearing is overrun by darkspawn.

She doesn’t, strictly speaking, need the coin. But the discount the mage is offering is a good one, and as much as this mission sets her teeth on edge, the chance that the ‘spawn might range out of the clearing is all too real. Aveline’s done what she can with the guard, but the chances are that someone else would get killed if the situation isn’t taken care of. And if there’s one thing the past year and a half has proven to Hawke, it’s that she’s good at taking care of situations.

She lies to her mother and Bethany about what she’s doing that day, swings by the Hanged Man to pick up both Isabela and Varric, and then pauses, thinking about who else she could bring on this mission.

…The fact that her friends are already heading to Darktown, engrossed in a discussion about Varric’s chest hair yet again, probably speaks volumes for her decision making skills as of late. In her defence, it only makes sense to have a mage in her party, particularly a mage who highly skilled in the arts of healing.

Arts which he’s using on someone when they walk into the clinic, and she almost walks right back out again when she sees it. Marian has other mages that she can take on this errand, but these refugees don’t have another healer. She turns on her heel, makes a face at the Looks she gets from both Isabela and Varric, and almost gets to the open door when his voice stops her.

“Hawke?”

“Anders!” she exclaims in return, pivoting on her heel to face him.”Fancy seeing you here, I was just – pacing. While I waited, that is. Shut up Varric.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“You didn’t have to.” She looks over at Anders, who is either amused, bemused, or both. “What are your feelings on Sundermount?

“Slightly better than my feelings towards the Wounded Coast, but there is more of a chance of running into giant spiders.” He’s doing that thing he does, where his tone is matter of fact, but his eyes crinkles at the corners in a way that means he’s teasing her. Stupid crinkly eyes – giant spiders were a legitimate bloody threat, and if she happened to go on long, curse-laden rants about them, that was perfectly acceptable.

“We’re not going into any caves – if those blighted things have migrated out of the caves, I quit.” She sighs, pushing a hand through her short hair, only to have it fall back into the exact same place. “I need the ironbark. Which means—”

“Darkspawn,” he interrupts, nodding. “I was there when you asked the Dalish.” A pause, and then a sigh, as he picks up his staff from where it leans against the wall nearby. “Why not? Might as well get some practice in before you drag us all into the Deep Roads.”

He gets a disgruntled face from her. “No one’s being dragged anywhere, except perhaps for Varric, and I’m not the one doing the dragging. You don’t have to come, Anders. I know you have patients.” Whether she means on this Sundermount trip or the Deep Roads expedition, looming perilously close in the future, even Marian herself can’t say.

His gaze lingers a second longer than it ought to, and she turns her head away for a moment, abruptly remembering a short, drunk and painful conversation in which she had related her family’s flight from Ferelden to him. She didn’t want to see the understanding in his eyes. “Who better to fight darkspawn than a Grey Warden? Almost reminds me of the old days, really – you certainly fit the half-mad Ferelden leader requirement.”

“Only half-mad?” She looks over at Varric and Isabela, as if asking them to dispute this. “I must not be trying hard enough.”

\- - -

The trip up Sundermount is enjoyable enough that Marian can ignore the disquiet roiling in her stomach. She hasn’t known any of her companions for all that long, but she still finds their company enjoyable, trading banter with them as they hike up the mountain. She might not trust them with her sister’s life, yet, but she certainly feels comfortable enough placing hers in their hands. Isabela is in the middle of a truly horrendous (and yet somehow strangely beautiful) anecdote when Marian holds up her hand, gesturing for them to stop.

“The clearing’s up ahead,” she murmurs, glancing over at Anders, who nods.

“The ‘spawn are in there,” he confirms, tugging his staff off his back. She wishes he would get something that doesn’t have a bloody human skull attached to it. “More than enough to overwhelm a Dalish hunter, working alone.”

Hawke sighs, rubbing at her forehead. “Wonderful. Story of my life, really, it was never going to be some sort of darkspawn puppy hybrid who’d bitten a hunter by mistake, was it?” She draws her sword from over her shoulder, holding it in front of her. Isabela and Varric already have their weapons ready to go. “All right, I’m going in first. Let the damn things surround me before you charge on in after, I can more damage if I’m not worried about hitting you lot in the face with a sword.”

“What – Hawke, these are darkspawn, not bandits who take one look at the kind of damage you can do and run off screaming. They’re not going to be intimidated even if you managed to take out – Hawke!”

She throws a grin over her shoulder, already halfway to the clearing as he yells after her. At first the place seems deserted, but then she takes one step too far in (or far enough, depending on how you look at it) and monsters spill out of nowhere from both sides. Adrenaline seizes her and a tight grin steals her face as she waits for them to storm closer, spins, kills six in one go while arrows rain down around her and flame explodes to her left, Isabela slipping out of thin air to her right and stabbing a Hurlock in the back.

Marian has never been one for revenge, and these are not the darkspawn that killed her brother, yet she can’t help the fire pumping through her blood as she lays about with her greatsword; in her mind’s eye, every monster is an ogre, each companion her brother as she kills, and saves them, and kills, and saves them. She barely feels the pain of an arrowhead sinking into her thigh, although she hears the sick sound of the two that pierce her left arm directly after.

“Hawke—!”

“Keep your knickers on, Anders, it barely pierced the armour!” By which she means, it’s not bad enough that she can’t hold her sword up, and that’s good enough that she doesn’t have to stop. Her teeth grit, and she lays about like the madwoman she’s more than once been accused of being. The inhuman cries of the darkspawn lessen, Varric and Isabela’s easy taunts becoming clearly until Hawke abruptly comes to a stop, having run out of things to kill.

“There,” she pants, looking around just to make sure. “That wasn’t so difficult, was it?”

Of course, the words have barely left her mouth when she hears that roar, the one she’s heard a thousand times in her dreams since that day, and as the ogre thunders over the rise she’s hit with such a powerful sense of déjà vu that she nearly staggers. The throb in her arm makes itself known, and she sucks in a hiss of air over her teeth, and then there’s barely time to think, so she doesn’t. The cry she makes is all but ripped from her throat as she rushes creature; it charges, and she’s thrown hard enough that her body makes some sort of ‘crack’ that doesn’t bode well for her, but she’s back on her feet in an instant. Her pulse pounds in her ears loud enough to drown out the concerned calls of her companions as she gathers her strength and delivers a blow that sends shockwaves ricocheting up her arms and all his severs the ogre from one of his.

The thing roars in pain and rage and she yells a challenge back at it. She forgets her friends, forgets her surroundings, forgets anything resembling strategy at all as she lays into the monster; there’s no finesse involved, just brute strength and an incoherent anger that bubbles up from her gut, boils over and all but chokes her. She’s never considered how a Reaver fights before, but a distant part of her thinks that this must be how it feels.

The beast is tired now; injured, slow. She sees her opening and takes a running leap that ends with her sword sliding through a gap in the thing’s mismatched armour, severing its spine. It crashes to the ground and she rolls, managing to avoid skewering herself as she does so. Coming to her feet, she plants her sword in the dirt and presses her forehead to the pommel. She doesn’t need to double check that it’s dead – years of killing things have taught her to recognise a deathblow when she delivers one.

There’s silence behind her until Isabela mutters something about loot and Varric suggests they do something about that and then the familiar sounds of bodies being stripped down reaches her ears and a smile quirks on her lips. She straightens, wipes off the worst of the blood and gore on her weapon, and slings it back over her shoulder.

“Hawke?”

Marian turns in time to see Anders standing nearby, hand half outstretched as thought he’d thought to touch her shoulder and then changed his mind. She meets his gaze steadily, picking apart his expression; worry, concern, maybe some small amount of understanding. She loves his face, it occurs to her, loves watching it shift to fit the situation and whatever it is he wants to say.

“Are you all right?” he asks her cautiously, and she raises her eyebrows at him.

Hands on her hips, she surveys the area thoughtfully. Spotting the tree that they’d come for in the first place, she steps over to it and rips off a hunk of ironbark, stuffing it into her seemingly bottomless bag. It’s amazing, what she can fit in there. That done, she wanders back over to Anders and offers him a smile.

“Nice weather we’re having today, don’t you think?” She holds up a hand to shade her eyes, squinting up at the sky. “Sunny.”

There’s a moment’s pause before he chuckles softly, and nods. “Yes, Hawke, it’s very sunny.”

They stay there like that for a moment, smiling at each other. And then he seems to remember that she has two arrows sticking out of her arm and a third in her thigh, and the lectures start as a green glow suffuses his hands and she’s complaining loud enough that Isabela and Varric find their way over (not to help, just to make comments they deem witty).

“Oh no, another ogre!” she cries, pointing over Anders’ shoulder; he turns and looks despite himself, despite knowing her.

“Hawke, don’t—”

But it’s too late, she’s already off and laughing, having deemed her wounds healed enough. He makes a half-hearted effort at following, but she hears his sigh even from the distance she’s at now.

They leave the ogre where it died; she never does return to that clearing. She’s never going to enjoy dealing with darkspawn, but the next time they face with them, she keeps her head.


End file.
